Darloth/AnimaAbilities

I don't even own the 2nd ed book and I'm already changing its anima abilities.

However, everything below is heavily work in progress... also, I'm strongly considering borrowing some of CrownedSun's anima abilities for use here, so many props to him. His animas (which are also cool, but not quite right for me) can be found here

But anyway, the dawncaste one is once again far too weak. Not to mention useless fighting most demons and primordials etc. For first edition, I changed it to add +2 dicepools to anyone fighting on the same side as the dawn caste who either was aquainted with them and their supernatural nature, or who succeeded a valor roll.

Now, in 2nd, it still costs 10m... But, it costs 10m when 11+ peripheral will do it ANYWAY... so it's clearly overcosted, especially for such a naff effect. Even at essence 3, a fair number of opponents will have valor 4 or 5. My solution... keep that, and add on top the +2 external bonus to anyone else fighting with/under the dawn caste.

Zenith - Aww, I -liked- the holy bolt of destruction ability... Still, their main anima is much better now. Why are they all so expensive though?

Night - Actually, I like these. Weird, huh? Aside from the price of the lesser stealth. 10m is a LOT of essence!

Twilight - broken, broken, broken. Finally, I have decided on a wp cost reducer for 1st edition twilights, maybe with a mote or wp reducer at 11+ for 2nd. Still unsure as to costing, currently erring towards 6 or 7 motes. It should also cause a display similar to that from sorcery, whether this is personal or peripheral motes or anything.

Eclipse - why the wp cost? If you just spend 11 motes, you can do this for free, but without the willpower, you just have to flare a bit. Why should stealthy pacts require 1wp? Again, 10m is too much. Drop to 5m, 1w, and maybe, maybe.

In general, for first edition, a rework of the twilight anima and making many cheaper are appropriate.

Actual Animas

Essence 1

Glows are always on, and are more a function of the caste's essential nature rather than a -power-. They're also all lifted straight from CrownedSun. They have less flavour here at the moment, as I felt wrong stealing his flufftext too, but it's much better. Go and read it.

• Dawn - Pay 1 less xp for every 5xp invested into a combo comprised solely of combat charms, minimum of 1xp discount on any combat combo.
• Zenith - reduce the difficulty of all Divine Intervention rolls by 1, on top of any other modifiers from Sacrifices or abilities. In addition, Zeniths may recieve infrequent advice and lore from the Unconquered Sun (stroyteller discretion). Zenith castes may burn a body that they touch for 1 mote per body, as core.
• Twilight - Get one extra success on any roll using memory, as long as you scored 1 or more successes naturally. Rolls relating to memory: Remembering something, copying a text from memory, -maybe- working from a plan held in memory (ST discretion), the lore/occult roll to see if you just -know- about a spirit's weakness or how to use some first age doohickey... stuff like that. Several rolls to resist/throw off mind-control may also count, especially those about remembering the true path of events if someone has 'changed' your mind.
• Night - Reroll one failed or botched roll per story, must be pertinant to the direct survival of the night caste. This explicitly INCLUDES a botch from an eclipse-caste bargain or other effect. Only one though. They also get the improved anima suppression powers from 2nd ed, to whit - pay 1m extra to suppress use of peripheral for any non-obvious charm, or double to suppress peripheral use of an obvious charm.
• Eclipse - can learn out of type charms, paying double xp and motecost.

Essence 2

• Dawn - pay 5m, appear glorious/terrible for a scene. Very obvious, but you can add +2 dice to all dawncaste abilities for you, any of your underlings/companions in reasonable LOS (same battle and they can see your anima, stroyteller discretion, etc). People unfamiliar with the dawn caste's supernatural nature will have to make a valor roll to benefit from this, and anyone who acts unvalourously loses the bonus. This doesn't stack with other dawncaste animas, but doesn't count as a charm-given bonus for die caps either.
• Zenith - 5 motes, take 1 less level of damage from any source. This cannot be done more than once per turn (or action in 2nd ed) and is doubled against the forces of darkness. (Demons, Undead, Abyssals, Infernals. NOT fae.)
• Twilight - spend 5 motes to subtract 1wp from the cost of a charm (including sorcery charms). This cannot be done more than once per turn (or action in 2nd ed)
• Night - pay 5 motes to add +1 difficulty to see, track, etc the night-caste, similar to core.
• Eclipse - pay 5m to sanctify an oath made with the Eclipse touching all parties. Now, here's a thing... should this cost willpower? I also want 'verbal oathes made in presence' to be an option, should that be an Extra Cost mode of this one, or the Ess 4 expansion ability?

Essence 3

At essence 3, all of the essence 2 abilities activate automatically and for free any time the Solar is showing 11+ motes of anima banner. Night castes DO get the +1 difficulty, but it really only applies to tracking rolls since seeing them is so blatantly obvious. However, the 2nd ed trick of masking their identity fits quite nicely here.

Another note, the Eclipse caste does not need to touch participants anymore, but they must be close enough to be affected by the Eclipse's anima banner. It's still nearly impossible to have oaths sanctified accidentally, but people should be wary of saying things they'd not like to be held to in close quarters with a flaring Eclipse.

Twilights may choose which charm per turn/action they reduce the willpower cost of, they're not limited to the first.

Zenith caste may automatically burn any body within Essence yards for free at 11+ anima expenditure. If done against a zombie, this costs 1m, and inflicts 1 autolevel of Agg damage (or instantly kills 1 extra), but can't be done more than once per turn. Works only on mindless undead with a body, or the ridden bodies of nemissaries/similar.

Essence 4 (Still very much prototypes, not finished yet)

These may only be activated once a scene. But they're still reflexive, non-charm actions. They all cost 10 motes of essence and 1 point of willpower, and none of these costs may ever be reduced.

• Dawn - Drawing upon the untold combat-mastery of the unconquered sun, the Dawn caste overcomes their innate restrictions, and for the rest of the turn they may use reflexive charms at any time, without using up their charmslot for the turn, charm following charm in a scintillating display of fluid prowess.
• Zenith - A pillar of light descends from the sky and surrounds the Zenith in a holy aura. For this turn, the Zenith is inviolate - None who are not trusted comrades can come within Essence yards, any already within this radius are harmlessly pushed back. No attacks which are not counted as immaterial will pass through this barrier in either direction, and for the duration of the effect, the Zenith may not leave the area. In addition, all solars within Essence miles will know this power has been used, and whether it was used specifically as a beacon or for its protective effects. Of course, in most places, the tower of light will be visible to everyone for much further than this.
• Twilight - perfect success on a twilight ability roll? - suggested by FluffySquirrel - Not sure about this. Feels too simple and not tied enough to anima. - need better idea here! Considering instant knowledge of vulnerabilities or other information-based power. Being able to inspect an opponent's sheet might be handy, or just being told of weaknesses, strengths, and the sort of thing they're likely to do.
• Night - Anima-flush. You were iconic, now it's GONE. As it explodes outwards in a spiral of (highly distracting) solar light, you get to make a stealth roll to hide. Considering +Essence autosuccesses on said stealth roll
• Eclipse - sanctify any verbal oath or swearing made in their presence, even if not truly intended as such. Watch out, constructive eclipses can be really nasty with this.

*Intrusive* Comments on a *Brain*storm Page - Orz go to your *House* and have *Parties*

It's good you've play-tested the animas to make sure they are in need of tweaking. --UncleChu

If you mean: It would be good if I had, or, it's good that I have (I havn't), then, yes, I know, tweaking is usually better after a playtest. But I'm mainly tweaking for 1st edition, with words on my opinions of 2nd. I've most certainly tested first, and twilight was broken. It's since got worse... lots of OTHER people have playtested it a little and it sure looks broken from every extent. Since, as I said, I havn't got and won't be playing the 2nd edition yet, if it turns out to actually be fine, I can always change it back. Only I don't think I will, since I don't like the IDEA of the twilight anima being defensive.
-- Darloth readies the ferrets and strawberries to respond to this intrusion ^_^

Random twilight caste anima idea that came to me this morning - It may be too powerfull. Or not powerfull enough. Dunno; Either way, I thought I'd pass it on, or at least find out what your opinion is..

The Loremasters of the Unconquored sun are the unparalelled masters of knowledge in all forms, not only for their mastery of their Caste abilities, but for their simple existance. Lit by the glory of their fadeing anima, the best and worst aspects of all that they survey were immediately obvious to their eyes: That which is great lit by the last rays of the setting sun, while that which is weak or unclean was cast into shadow. (/Flavor Text)

The Twilight may spend 10 motes and immediately learn the general nature of the most powerfull skill and greatest weakness of anything within sight for the entire sceene. For creatures, this will be the most powerfull charm or combo, or their highest attribute+ability pool (but not it's size) and their greatest weakness(Lowest pool); For things, spells and writings this will be their greatest strength or best use and greatest flaw - used to aid in any caste ability rolls, this allows the Exalt to negate up to their essence in dice of penalties from any source *or* add one automatic success. Gamlain

Two questions: (1) Regarding the Dawn Caste boost to combat abilities for everyone around them, on their side, etc. The question starts like this... "25 Dawn Caste walk into a bar, and flare their animas...". How does it end? And for (2) How is the Essence 3 Twilight ability any better? You spend 5m, and save a WP each round. Not a big difference if you choose where it comes from. Now automagically saving one per round, that's a big deal. Alternately, reducing the cost to 3m per WP (still at once per round) is mucho nice. -- GreenLantern, poking his head in

I think the essence 3 one does indeed just give you a free willpower point each round.. that I could see. FluffySquirrel

Yes, it is indeed a big deal. But only one from -charms- every round. If you're using a wp costing charm every round, that's kinda expensive in other things, and it really does limit your choices as to charmpicks. You can't throw a combo for free(that's not a charm-cost) you can't channel for free(ditto), you CAN use sorcery, but it's only 1 discount... It's a very nice ability, but so are (hopefully) all the rest. Night-castes are slightly disadvantaged in 11+, but they have other nice benefits, such as a hanging reroll all the way back at Ess 1. Thanks for your critique anyway though, and yeah, a clarification on the dawncaste ability is needed. They do not stack ^_^
-- Darloth

Awww, why not? 25 Dawn Castes in one place, leading armies of their own, is exactly the kind of thing that killed the Primordials...DeathBySurfeit

With regards the new Essence 4 Dawn Caste ideas, I like the suggestion of being able to block perfect attacks as though they were normal ones; this is especially balanced if paid on a by-attack basis when anima banners aren't showing. It'd also be a good idea to consider mirrorability for the Dusk Caste - being able to perfectify attacks without Charm use is a nice variant...DeathBySurfeit

Gak no! Perfect-ifying attacks is like uber uber. That's two ubers - at once! That means that I can launch a flurry (or multi attack) at you. I enhance the first one with, say, Excellent Strike, for 2 motes. Recognizing that I've just used my charm action, sans combo (no giant flashie), you decide to reflexively activate a reflexive scene-long charm, or perhaps a relatively weak defensive charm, such as GEB, since you'll be 'safe' this turn. On my second and subsequent attacks, I perfect-ify them, and kill you. Oh well, you lose. -- GreenLantern, on why making something perfect after a charm usage without a combo is the deadliest trick in the book.

The level 4 abilities will not trigger automatically on anima-flare. Yes, perfectifying attacks is indeed deadly. I had considered unblockable instead, and either way, if I have an offensive ability for dawn/dusk, I think it will need to be incompatible with charms, or people will be unleashing horrible 16-perfect-attacks-of-doom for 2wp and 50 motes.
-- Darloth hopes people keep talking, more ideas always good!

I had several more ideas for the Ess 4 animas, and they're looking not too bad. Suggestions are welcome, please give me critique!
-- Darloth

I may adapt Gamlain's idea at a higher powerlevel for Ess 4 twilight, so that it isn't combat limited. Actually, that sounds very good. Thanks for the idea... it's looking very possible ^_^
-- Darloth

My suggestion for Twilight 4 anima - Essence shows you the way. When you fire it off, you get an extra dice action. This action is above and beyond the normal turn, so you can roll a second dodge/parry if you like against an attack; it may not be split and extra-action items have no effect. For this action, all your abilities are at Ess dots (yes, all of them) and if you had dots to begin with, those are converted into autosuccesses. Dar feels it isn't cool enough, but I think the sheer versatility of the option both inside and outside combat trumps the relatively minor special effects.
-- Veav